The Three Dwarfs in the Woods
by Sharap'n
Summary: PG for violence. AU, GWHP. Ginevra Weasley is blessed by three dwarves to be prettier every day, spurt out jewels, and live happily ever after. Prince Harry saves her from her evil stepmother and stepsister, and Luna Lovegood gets to be extra-dotty!


This is my all-time fave fairy tale. I decided to adapt it into HP! I'm not makin' a cent off this. If I owned Three Dwarfs in the Woods or Harry Potter then I probably would be selling this in a top NY bookstore. But I don't, so I'm not.  
  
And I know that Cho is only two years older than Ginny, but for the purpose of the plot, let's pretend she's twenty or so years older.  
  
I'm not sure what Ginny's real name is. Some write it as Virginia, others Ginevra. Ginevra suits this fic more, so I'll use that one. Hope you don't mind.  
  
-----  
  
Arthur Weasley looked upon his wife in adoration. How pretty she was, even in pregnancy. She was due to give birth any minute. Her face screwed up in pain, and doctors closed the curtain around her bed, shutting Arthur out. He didn't mind that much. His baby was about to be born. After a bit of ear- splitting screams, there was a soft laugh of relief, and the sound of a baby crying. He eagerly pushed aside the curtains, but his grin faded as he saw the grim faces of the doctors. His baby was in the arms of one of them, perfectly normal, so why were they looking so down?  
  
"I'm sorry, Mr. Weasley." One doctor said. "We saved the baby, but we couldn't save the mother. It's a girl."  
  
Weeping and holding his daughter, he collapsed onto his wife's bed. Molly's eyes were closed and she looked like she usually did when she slept – but the lack of breathing told him an entirely different story.  
  
"Ginevra." He muttered. "Ginny Weasley, welcome to the world."  
  
-----  
  
Five years later...  
  
-----  
  
"Daddy!" Ginny squealed, as her father picked her up and swung her around. "Where did you go?"  
  
"Daddy went away for a little while, sweetie." He said. "Daddy's married again!"  
  
"To mummy?"  
  
Arthur closed his eyes at the memory of Molly and put Ginny down on the ground. "No, honey. Mummy's gone someplace better than this world. Meet Cho Chang."  
  
A tall, beautiful woman with long black hair stepped out of the shadows, smiling an odd smile that didn't reach her eyes. Ginny thought this woman was untrustworthy, and hid fearfully behind her father's legs. He sighed, and looked up at Cho.  
  
"She'll come around, sooner or later." He said, touching Cho's shoulder. But as soon as their flesh met, Arthur was blown across the room, where he lay, eyes shut.  
  
"Daddy!" Ginny cried, running over, but she knew he was dead. She turned to Cho angrily. "You! You killed him!"  
  
When Cho spoke, it was in a sweet voice, designed to allure. But Ginny was not fooled. She heard the bitter underneath the sweet.  
  
"It was an accident, Ginevra." She whispered. "A terrible accident."  
  
"My name is Ginny!" She shouted.  
  
"Now, Ginevra, don't go losing your temper. Especially in front of your new stepsister."  
  
For the first time, Ginny saw the small girl of around her age emerge from the shadow that her mother had once hidden in. Her tan face was so different from her mother's pale one, her hair colour a chestnut brown, unlike Cho's black tresses.  
  
"This is Hermione, Ginevra."  
  
-----  
  
"Ginevra!" Cho screeched. Ginny winced, and dropped the cloth she was dusting the mantelpiece with to run to her stepmother. "Hermione has a favour for strawberries – take this basket, and don't come back until it's full."  
  
"But it's winter! There are no strawberries! I'll freeze!"  
  
But Cho wouldn't take no for an answer. She shunted Ginny outside, wearing nothing but a paper dress, carrying no food in her basket except a slice of bread.  
  
"Ungrateful wretch!" Cho shrieked. "I give her clothes to wear and food to eat and she doesn't even give me a scrap of thanks!"  
  
It was nighttime, and the snow tinkled underneath her bare feet. She had been searching for hours, and there was no sign of red amongst the white background. She turned back, and saw a cabin that she was sure hadn't been there before. But she saw an orange glow coming from the window, and smiled, thinking of asking to warm her icy feet by their fire. She knocked three times lightly on the door, and it opened almost immediately, showing a man no more than two feet tall.  
  
"Please kind sir, I wish to warm myself by your fire, if that is possible." She asked softly. The man grinned.  
  
"If you will shovel our path for us, miss." He said. "It's dreadfully hard to see it when snow covers it."  
  
Ginny took the shovel offered to her and she dug at the snow. But as the first mound of white powder came up from the ground, she saw several fat strawberries underneath the frozen rain. In amazement at how strawberries could have grown underneath icy cold snow, she filled her basket with them and finished shovelling the dwarfs' walk. Knocking at the door again, a different dwarf answered the door, and let her in, and she let the warm air wash over her like a warm blanket.  
  
"Hello, miss!" Another dwarf said. "My name's Dumbledore, and these are my friends, Mad-Eye Moody and Professor Flitwick. We are the three dwarfs of the woods."  
  
Greeting the dwarfs, she took the slice of bread out from the basket, and the dwarfs begged her to share it, so she broke it in half, then half again, and they each had a quarter. After a time, she made her farewells and hurried back to her house, and the three dwarfs waved their hands and the path covered over with snow again. They sat down on the porch steps.  
  
"She is very kind." Dumbledore said.  
  
"And kindness deserves rewards." Moody said.  
  
"Every day, she will grow prettier." Flitwick said.  
  
"And whenever she speaks, jewels will fall from her mouth." Said Dumbledore.  
  
"She will live happily ever after." Said Moody.  
  
"It is done." The three dwarfs said, waving their arms.  
  
-----  
  
Ginny stepped into the warm house, and presented the basket to Hermione, who gobbled up the strawberries instantly.  
  
"Where did you find those?" Cho asked loudly.  
  
"Under the snow, near a hut with dwarfs inside!" Ginny said, but, as she spoke, a stream of rubies fell to the ground.  
  
"Strawberries under the snow? Speaking rubies? That is a lie." Cho hissed, and sent Ginny to the attic to sweep out the dust.  
  
The next day, Ginny was more radiant than ever. Cho was furious. "Is this another one of your lies, child?" She shrieked.  
  
"No, I swear, I don't know how this happened, I think it has something to do with those three dwarfs in the woods!"  
  
Cho mulled it over in her head. "Hermione!" She shrieked, and her daughter came scuttling over.  
  
"Yes mama?"  
  
"Go out and search for strawberries."  
  
"But mama..."  
  
"Now!"  
  
Grumbling, Hermione left the house, wearing a thick fur coat, and with a basket of food to take with her. She searched all day, and half the night, and her fingers were almost dropping off with frostbite, when she noticed a cabin, with an orange glow coming from it. She kicked at the door, and a small man answered it.  
  
"Let me in, shorty." She ordered.  
  
"Would you be so kind as to shovel our path for us?"  
  
"What do I look like, your slave? Do it yourself!" She said, pushing into the cabin. The other two dwarfs stared, then asked her to share her food. "As if! I'm starving, and I only have enough for myself."  
  
Hermione ate her food greedily, then left the cabin without a backward glance. The three dwarfs stared after her.  
  
"She is very unkind." Dumbledore said.  
  
"And even unkindness deserves rewards." Moody said.  
  
"Every day, she will grow uglier." Flitwick said.  
  
"And whenever she speaks, toads will fall from her mouth." Said Dumbledore.  
  
"She will die a horrible death." Said Moody.  
  
"It is done." The three dwarfs said, waving their arms.  
  
-----  
  
The next morning, Hermione arrived back at the house, fuming.  
  
"There were no strawberries! That freak made it up!" She yelled, pointing at Ginny. Toads leapt from her mouth and Cho turned around so fast she must have got whiplash.  
  
"Ginevra!" She shrieked. "Take this sheet down to the lake, and wash it until it is clean! And you..." She said, addressing Hermione, "Don't you dare open your mouth ever again."  
  
"But the lake's frozen solid!" Ginny protested.  
  
"Then take this sledge hammer, and break it open!"  
  
"That stain's been there since summer! I'll freeze before it comes out!"  
  
"Then freeze, and let that be a lesson to you!" Cho screamed, pushing Ginny outside.  
  
Ginny brought the hammer down with all her might, but just couldn't manage to break the thick ice covering the water. She slipped, and ended up sitting on the ice, the heat from her body melting the top layer of ice, which in turn soaked straight through her paper dress. Which is when the hand came down to help her up. She looked up into the bottle green eyes of Prince Harry Potter, the future king of the land. A small, golden crown rested upon his messy black hair.  
  
"What are you doing out here? It's the middle of winter." He asked, with an air of amusement about him.  
  
"My stepmother and stepsister made me come out here to wash the sheet, your highness."  
  
Prince Harry looked affronted. "Come over, warm yourself in my carriage."  
  
"Oh, I could never do that, your highness –"  
  
"I'm not taking no for an answer. Now stop with the 'your highness' stuff. It's Harry."  
  
Ginny smiled and let herself be helped up by the Prince, and as he looked at her properly, he could see that she was the most beautiful creature he had ever laid eyes on, and he was completely in love. Harry's servant, Draco, looked on at Harry and Ginny. "Perfect couple." Draco murmured.  
  
"Please, come back to the palace with me, and I will send for your stepmother and stepsister later, if you answer this one question." Harry said. "Will you marry me?"  
  
Graciously, Ginny accepted, and the second they got to Harry's palace, he put her in a white gown, and called for the priest. Within the hour, they were married, and Cho and Hermione were at Ginny's feet, begging for forgiveness. Of course, she granted them that, and they all lived in the castle. It seemed that they would live happily ever after, but it was not so.  
  
Cho desperately wanted her own daughter on the throne, so she crept into Ginny's bedroom while she was still asleep, and threw her out the window. But Ginny did not die. She transformed into a swan, wearing a small, golden tiara on her head, and she floated about the pond outside her window, until the sun rose, and Draco came out to the grounds to do a spot of weeding. Ginny squawked at him, and he turned to face her.  
  
"Please, this is your queen. I have been transformed, so please get your master to swing his sword three times around my head and I will be cured."  
  
Draco nodded and rushed inside to get Harry, who came outside, and swung his sword over the head of the swan wearing the tiara, and she transformed back into the redhaired queen, and Ginny explained how her stepmother had pushed her out of the window.  
  
Later that day, Harry approached Cho.  
  
"What do you think is a suitable punishment for someone who tried to murder an innocent person?" He asked.  
  
"They should be put in a barrel of spikes and rolled down a hill into a lake." Cho said, her violent edge taking over.  
  
"You have just pronounced your own fate." Harry said.  
  
And they all lived happily ever after. Well, except for Cho and Hermione, who got put into barrels of spikes and rolled down a hill into a lake.  
  
-----  
  
Luna Lovegood, a girl with dirty blonde hair and a permanent smile, knocked on the door of a small cottage, and asked to sit by the fire. The dwarf who answered the door looked puzzled. They didn't have a fire going.  
  
"Will you, er, shovel the show off our walk?" The dwarf asked, and Luna turned around to see the snow. It was the middle of summer.  
  
"Sure!" Luna said, and shovelled the walk for them. But instead of returning, she seemed to forget what she was doing, and wandered off aimlessly. The dwarfs sat down on the porch.  
  
"She is very strange." Dumbledore said.  
  
"And even dottiness deserves rewards." Moody said.  
  
"Every day, she will grow crazier." Flitwick said.  
  
"And whenever she speaks, strange revelations will fall from her mouth." Said Dumbledore.  
  
"She will believe anything someone tells her." Said Moody.  
  
"It is done." The three dwarfs said, waving their arms.  
  
"Slow week." Dumbledore said, and they sipped their beers and watched the sun set. 


End file.
